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I’m Bob Larson. Another setback for the proposed Millennium Bulk Terminal in Longview. Last Tuesday, the Cowlitz County hearings examiner denied a shoreline permit.

Millennium is already appealing a decision by the Department of Ecology last month to deny a water quality permit, but has also filed a separate lawsuit feeling DOE went well outside the scope of the requirements for the permit.

Washington Farm Bureau president John Stuhlmiller says it’s like a broken record …

JOHN STUHLMILLER … “Yet another very disappointing decision. This, really, is kind of amazing watching this process unfold. Again, it turned on issues that were not related to the core of the permit. This is a shoreline permit. And, so it turned again on those outside extraneous things. In fact, what it really turns on is, there’s going to be more commerce so we can’t have the project. That’s really, you can translate it into that because that’s what they’re saying is because of more rail traffic and more ocean traffic, we can’t have this project go forward.”

Stuhlmiller says Millennium has already made big improvements to the site …

JOHN STUHLMILLER … “I don’t know if it was classed a ‘brownfield’, but it was a facility that was, Alcoa I believe it was, was there before and it needed a lot of cleanup and already Millennium has done that. So, you’ve already got a site that’s better than it was when they took it on in the hopes of getting this bulk facility developed.

It’s already better, but this is not pristine, you know, you’d say let’s have a park here. This is industrial. This is heavy industrial and has been and you’re not going to put home on these sites.”